Category Archives: WCB Crafts in Action

What do you do when you’re going on a bachelorette with your group of closest friends? Lots of things, but if you’re me… You. Make. Props!

One of my really close friends, Liana, is tying the knot at the end of the month and so we’re going all out with the “last fling before the ring,” all the way to one of her favorite places: New York City. Her sister and Maid of Honor, Katrina, very kindly requested I made some props for the big weekend, and of course I was very excited to make this set, being for such an amazing friend and what was promising to be a super fun weekend. The color scheme of some of the bach items was pink and gold, so I knew I’d stick to that for the props. Without further ado, some pics of the set (I forgot to do my semi professional set-up before leaving, so the pictures aren’t that great. Also, we barely got to use the props because of the back-to-back schedule we committed to haha! #BachLife

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

The props were a surprise for Liana, and when she saw them she said she may be biased, but this was her favorite set I’ve ever made! I’ll take that type of bias any day 😉 Happy wedding my dear friend!

Let’s talk about concerts for a minute, shall we? It has gotten truly ridiculously expensive to go see your favorite musician lately. Ticket prices + venue fees + parking/Uber cost + refreshments/food at the venue + artist memorabilia = where do I file for bankruptcy?! It’s a lot. When I was little, of course I’d beg my parents for the shirt or hat or bandana or keychain or any memento I could keep as a souvenir, but now as an adult, I dare not even glance over at the merchandise section.

I usually wear normal clothes to concerts, but as the date for the J.Cole concert in Orlando was approaching, my brother suggested I should make some shirts for us. I was super surprised he had this idea because 1. Neither he nor I are the type to do this and 2. I really hadn’t thought about making myself any artist-related clothing item for a concert, ever. But this was a cool moment for me, since my brother never asks me to make anything and I was so touched he wanted me to do it that I was 100% in.

When it comes to these things, I try to be as frugal as possible. If it’s not something I can see myself wearing often, I will not splurge on it. Plus, if it’s a DIY, it should be cheaper, right? Right. So, when it came to the Heat Transfer Vinyl (HTV), I decided not to buy any, but make use of what I already had. No need to spend extra or go crazy with that. And for the shirts, since I had the experience with the ones I made for my Game of Thrones watch party, I knew I’d find something at Walmart. I found a black shirt for me for under $4, and even though my brother actually didn’t like any of the options there, he ended up finding a v-neck at TJ Maxx for $4 as well. With the amount of HTV I ended up using, each shirt basically came out to $6!

When it came time to design it, I wanted to have J.Cole’s face and hair silhouette which has become a big part of his brand, and also incorporate the crown from his Born Sinner album artwork. I ended up designing/cutting/putting it all together the same day of the concert because #ProcrastinationNation. And the crazy thing here was that since I was only using what I had, there was no room for error. Whatever I’d cut, it had to work. Because of the amount of each color I had, I decided that my brother would get Cole’s face silhouette, and I’d do my shirt with only the crown. I looooved how they turned out!

The original design… I also wanted to add the Dreamville to the back of my brother’s shirt, but I ran out of vinyl 😦

Vision brought to reality! The Cricut never disappoints, look at those perfect cuts!

Two happy sibs enjoying their favorite rapper in homemade shirts!

And here’s the best part of it all: during the concert, there was a lot of camera focus on the audience, and at some point my brother caught us on the jumbotron, BECAUSE he recognized the print on his shirt! It was so cool to see my shirts on the big screen, looking like official merch, but made by me :’)

Up until last year, I wasn’t interested in Game of Thrones or any of the events that came to be on the show (#RedWedding), but with all the social media ruckus about Mr. Jon Snow, it peaked my curiosity just enough to watch the first episode of season 6 to find out whether or not he’d make it through… Except that, as avid watchers know, we don’t get an answer until the last moments of episode 2. By this point, a few other interesting things had happened, and let’s just say I’d found a new favorite thing to do with my Sundays at 9pm. I watched the rest of season 6 without any prior knowledge, something that came in handy with the episode “The Door,” because while everyone was distraught mourning the death of one of their favorite characters, I wasn’t anywhere near the level of attachment everyone had built over the prior 56 episodes. #HoldTheDoor crisis averted.

Needless to say, I was hooked but also a little lost – as much as I picked up on things, there’s way too much ground covered in 5 seasons that cannot be deduced during 10 episodes, especially not on this show. But I also didn’t want to get hooked… So, I let months go by until I couldn’t wait any longer and I finally binged seasons one through five in a week, then re-watched season 6, feeling the proper things we’re all meant to feel (#RedWeddingVictim)… and this brings us to yesterday.

7.16. The date that has been tattooed on our brains for months as we anxiously awaited season 7 (not to mention it started at a later date and coming with less episodes than any prior season… see, it’s like I’ve been here from day 1!), and this time I was on time and part of the gang! I had been victimized by George R. R. Martin, David Benioff and Dan Weiss along with millions of others, and I was ready to continue being a masochist, but I wanted to do it in style. Thanking the old gods and the new for Pinterest, see below my Night’s Watch approved watch-party, which I must start by saying I was not willing to spend any money on. Everything you’re about to see was whipped up from items I already owned. I know, I’m a crafter and not everyone has these things handy, but I’m proud to say the only money I spent specifically on this party was a grand total of $6.40.

It all started with an Iron Throne…

Not wanting to spend money or get too into it, this silver poster board I already had would make the perfect back seat!

I started by drawing the top spears first

Then I drew in the rest of the swords

And then I got some silver fabric I had stored away to complete the look of the chair

But when I looked from far away, I noticed it’d be hard to tell the sword detailing

So I went over my pencil drawings with black marker and boom!

Got myself an iron throne at home 🙂

But then when I placed the throne against my TV station, it looked weird. It needed a better backdrop. So…

I covered half of my TV station in red fabric (because of the Red Keep)

And now our pictures would look better!

Throne? Done! Backdrop? All-set!

I wanted to make a banner with all the house banners, but once I was done with it, it was longer than just half of the TV station… more red fabric, to the rescue! (FYI this is where I spent my $6.40, printing the banners!)

I made the less known houses smaller

Then went from less relevant

To more show-centric houses in the middle

And House Stark of course at the center of it all

Greyjoy is joining the big leagues this season

And Mormont is at the end of the big ones due to color, not participation! #LyannaMormontForPresident

We all need to have some Braavosi coins in our possession this season, just in case…

The food! Flayed dogs, Hodoritos, Baratheon Brie & Sansa Lemon Cakes

Changed the labels on a few beers with the help of Pinterest, as usual! And found a couple that didn’t need any alterations 😉

I had all of this planned out and then one of my friends who was coming to the party suggested we make shirts for ourselves. You know I don’t need to be asked twice…

Found these shirts at Walmart for just $5 each, and the fabric was GREAT!

In honor of Tyrion’s famous phrase!

In honor of #GirlPower, #GirlLove, and to quote the all-around badass Daenerys Stormborn herself!

For my shirt: if I were to walk around with my personal introducer, Westeros style, this might be what is said

And what I think was THE BEST decor item EVER, and will forever be grateful to Pinterest for providing this amazing idea –

My watch party guests had to enter the bathroom at their own risk…

Because Tyrion was in position, waiting, locked and loaded!

That’s all folks! Hope you enjoyed seeing this watch party come to life 🙂 I’ll leave the decor up for the remainder of season 7. Have you done something like this for your own watch parties? Any ideas for upcoming episodes? Let me know in the comments below!

Now that my best friend got engaged, I am the happiest crafter alive, and I’m ready to make ALL of the things. First stop: engagement party central!

My biff (that’s what we call each other :P) Michelle, like most women, has had an idea of what she wants her wedding to look like, so her mom Marta and I are going with a similar feel for the engagement party. The rustic vibe is very in right now and she likes it a lot, so let’s get to it!

Michelle’s parents have a beautiful home with a great backyard where they’ve hosted lots and lots of parties, so we know the space pretty well and have an idea of how to set things up to maximize each area. This Pinterest board has a lot of the inspiration for the stuff I made for the party, so let’s dive right in to the final products!

The decor: I’ll wrap a few of the items into this category so this doesn’t end up the long testament my blogs usually are hehe… Our color palette for the party was Blush Pink, Taupe, Ivory & Rose Gold. Lots of burlap, lace, and a vintage classic vibe made everything really pretty and Pinterest-y!

The food table, set up by Marta’s interior designer friend! I actually broke one of those white plates, because me and clumsy go together like PB & J!

This was the sweets table. This was super inspired by Pinterest, but the wind didn’t cooperate much with us…

Longest tassel garland in the world! I didn’t expect it to be so big…

The photo booth & props: Brian (Michelle’s fiance) is very handy, so Marta and I asked him to build a rustic-looking frame that we could drape and place in the garden to create a photo booth area. Brian did such an amazing job that I almost didn’t even want to dress the frame, but at the same time I’ve been loving the mixture of delicate with rustic/industrial so with his part done, it was time to make it pop. The fabric Marta found for the frame was shiny, shimmery & splendid. I also did a “she said yaaasss” banner, and added some vintage bulbs and baby’s breath to make it all come together. To finish the look, we hung a bunch of mismatched lamps from the tree, and it all looked beautiful both during the day and at night! For the props, I wanted to do something different from what I always do, since after all, props are kind of my niche… I actually started to design a completely different idea from what it ended up being, but I’m super happy with the end result. I used burlap paper, designed the props on PowerPoint, printed them out, cut & glued them to cardstock for hold and voila! Awesome props to complement an already great photo booth area!

During the day the photobooth looked so nice, and the sun GLEAMED on the rose gold “she said yaaasss” banner

I got really visual with these, and I wanted the prop shape to reflect the prop message. And such realistic looking paper!

At night, with all the lanterns on, this was the perfect romantic backdrop for everyone’s pictures!

The favors: I didn’t get any good pictures of the final product here, but long story short: plastic bags, burlap strips, circle “Brian POPPED the question, Michelle said yes!” tags, popcorn. You get the idea!

The plastic bags with the strips of burlap glued to the bottom

The little circle tags

The big basket with all the bags… and I forgot to get a good shot

The calligraphy: boy oh boy do I hate my handwriting/penmanship. I’ve always wanted to have pretty handwriting, but it’s just not in my skill set. I can pull off a few tries but I hate writing slowly and when I go fast, there’s no way to control the strokes… So when Marta showed me the boards and table tent signs, I kind of swallowed hard and said ok… I got this! I did those the night before the party, and I was so stressed the entire time. If I’m honest, the first tent signs didn’t come out as good as the last ones. It’s true what they say, calligraphy is a practice thing. Although some people are just born with those magically beautiful calligraphy skills!

Marta found a packet that brought 5 of these tent double-sided signs, which was perfect because there were 5 tables. So I had to write the hashtag 10 times… I was trying to replicate the Autumn in November font. Not the worst I’ve done!

This I wasn’t super happy with, I wanted to add some flourishes at the bottom because it just felt empty, but I decided to cut my losses and call it a day after it all miraculously fit and I didn’t mess up

Some close-ups: making this cake topper gave me so much life! I couldn’t stop staring at my Cricut cutting the rose gold card stock stuff! And I had a full blown photo shoot with the mason jars when I finished dressing them… O-B-S-E-S-S-E-D. Have I mentioned I don’t typically like burlap?! I know…

Look at that pretty lace! Love the way these came out

Ohhhhh the way the light hits that rose gold is a poem!

The whole combo. Mix & match is so fun!

We picked out that lace and burlap ribbon as well as the flowers ourselves!

The edgy fun part: when it comes to Michelle’s family, there’s always something fun/edgy/borderline inappropriate thing happening, and I’m all too happy to oblige and do my part for it. This time around, Marta bought an apron for Michelle’s uncle as he’d be cooking the dinner during the party, and again, thank you Pinterest for this awesomely hilarious idea 🙂

I ironed this for what felt like hours, and it still didn’t cooperate for the picture…

Haha. Every time I look at this, I laugh even more!

After about a month of prep, I’m truly so happy with how everything turned out and now I can focus on the bachelorette, bridal shower and whatever Michelle asks me to make for the wedding! (please biff, let me make it allllllllllllllllllllllllll! haha kidding! no, not really…)

PS: Oh and one last thing – this was something new I decided to try: window cling! I wanted to make something for the bar area, so I went with some string lights, a “cheers to michelle & brian,” and that’s all she wrote! For real this time!

I added a heart with a “to” afterwards but this picture is where the window cling shows the best!

Before I show you the final pictures of everything, let’s talk about the pickup. When I was asked to make the ramp, I told birthday boy Mateo’s mom that I didn’t want to go too big because 1. Transportation and 2. Fitting it through doors/doorways. She said that wouldn’t be a problem. So when I was looking for the materials, I ran the size by her (4 x 8 ft.), and she said yes, so I proceeded. She mentioned she had a big car, so I didn’t give it much thought. After the initial building of the structure, I felt I had to confirm with her that this wouldn’t fit in a standard SUV, and she should borrow a van or pick-up truck because otherwise, this monster ramp wouldn’t make it out of my house. She was thankfully able to find a friend with a truck, and we were good to go… on to a few more hiccups.

On the morning of the order pickup (just a few hours before the party started), Mateo’s dad showed up with a friend and a pick-up truck, and as soon as they both saw the ramp they said “WOW” and their eyes bulged out a bit as they turned to see how they’d make this work. As soon as I saw the truck, I could see the bed wasn’t long enough for the ramp to fit with the latch closed… So I started panicking internally a bit. The one good thing about the ramp, is that it was surprisingly lightweight. When they carried it and placed it on the truck, it looked like this –

It. Reached. All. The. Way. Down. To. The. Latch. AHH. Thankfully, I had the rope I bought to bring the wood home with me from the store, and also some bungee cords. They tied it down and promised to drive slowly. I later found out it took them an hour and thirty minutes to get home. That’s a promise well-kept! The big truck prop didn’t fit (anywhere really) but we managed to squeeze it in the sedan they brought along by folding the top lights a bit. Remember how I didn’t glue the flag out of fear it would make the fit even worse? Best idea I’ve ever had.

But don’t relax for one second because now the best part starts – as they’re making knots securing the ramp, I hear something about an elevator ride… and I ask “wait, the party isn’t on a ground floor?!” And to my shock, no, it wasn’t. The party was on a sixth floor. Guys. When I tell you I nearly fainted upon hearing this, I’m not kidding. You mean, a structure I’ve never built before has to not only survive 3-5 year old children, but it also has to fit into an elevator? Had I known this from the beginning, I would’ve gone for something much, much smaller. To make the rest of the long story short – the ramp made it! After unsuccessfully trying to bring it up the stairs (due to length clashing with angles/turns), they figured out that even though the elevator threshold was low, the inside was more giving and they could slide it in. But – one more hiccup, for the ride – the elevator door-frame at the 6th floor was slightly thinner than where they packed it in, so they had one last struggle getting it out.

Thankfully, I saw pictures and videos of the birthday boy, Mateo, and all his friends having a great time sliding down the monster trucks, and we all lived happily ever after. And finally for the long-awaited pictures –

Now as you can imagine, this is every crafty person’s dream come true, because with all the joy and none of the stress on oneself, the crafting possibilities are endless. I want to make ALL OF THE THINGS, and oh, I will.

Michelle and I have been best friends along with our group for now almost 10 years (crazy!) and we’ve been through a lot together, which is what builds a super strong friendship, but even better – her family loves me and I love them, and they’ve borderline adopted me into their circle as well, so this feels like my real sister is walking down the aisle, and I’m alllll in my feelings! The best way to deal with those, you ask? Crafting, of course.

So first things first – I got a head start on the engagement surprise because her fiance reached out to me for some advice on the ring, and as soon as I got that text, you know my head went into overboard mode of what to make her/get her so I could put together a nice little “welcome to engaged life” gift for her. I wanted to give her a personalized mug, but the time frame was short, so I wouldn’t be able to place an order and thus, this would be my first wedding-related DIY project! I love all the “feyoncé” merchandise I’ve seen around, so I wanted to have the mug say that, but I didn’t want that to be the only thing on it… It had to be more personalized. So I decided to do something on both sides, and bam! Perfection.

Side A – Future Mrs. Pineda

Side B – Feyoncé

Then, I really loved the idea of some sort of journal or album where she could include printed pictures and polaroids which are very in right now, and when I searched on amazon, this Bride To Be Book was one of the first to pop up. I wanted to see the inside, of which there were unfortunately no pictures on amazon or google, but then I found this blog that showed enough for me to pull the trigger and buy it! I was planning on bringing my Polaroid camera and snapping the moment Brian was down on one knee (which I didn’t quite get in the end because of multitasking, but still got some cute ones thankfully), and now it looks like this –

The Bride to be Book

The engagement page, filled with the polaroids I had just taken

Finally, Michelle’s mom asked me to make a version of these very funny props that say “He asked” and “She Said About Damn Time,” so I found some faux wood card stock and got to work. I also brought a long a set of my standard engagement props so that we could play around photo booth style after the proposal. All in all, it was a great first opportunity to put my craftskills to use, and the beginning of a loooonggg road of engagement-and-wedding-related crafting ahead!

I can’t recall if I’ve written much about DPhiE (Delta Phi Epsilon, my sorority) on the blog, but I can summarize it with the following:

100 years ago, five women who were shunned from joining other sororities due to their religious beliefs, banded together to create a non-sectarian organization, welcoming women from all walks of life who were looking to uphold the values of dedication, pride, excellence, justice, sisterhood and love. In 2007, that organization welcomed me to their Alpha Gamma chapter at FIU, and today my career and my circle of friends has been shaped almost exclusively by that experience.

I have so much to thank DPhiE for – giving me confidence in myself to reach for high opportunities, exposing me to people from all kinds of backgrounds, improving and cultivating my skills (something I’d realize the value of once in Corporate America), and just an overall exponential growth that would’ve otherwise been unlikely to happen without my immersive experience in it.

As my sisters all over the world get ready to celebrate 100 years of sisterhood and all that it means to each of us, headquarters is hosting a couple of events, for which they reached out to me to create a set of custom, jumbo and glittery props to liven up pictures. I also made some of these for the bi-annual convention, so behold, a purple and gold parade of your dreams!

I had a blast designing these, and I do have a special attachment to them because of what DPhiE means to me. The pictures honestly don’t do the shine of the glitter justice, but trust me when I tell you that coupled with the camera flash, they’re BLINDING! My favorites to make were the DPhiE 100 with the centennial written in cursive in front (cursive font is Magnolia Sky for anyone interested), and the white iridescent circle with the 100 in the middle of the dot triangle. That was the new DPhiE logo, and I got to bring it to life with endless glitter. #Obsessed.

I also got some shots of sisters enjoying the props during the event:

The “throw what you know” hand sign in perspective (bottom right picture) is EVERYTHING! Love seeing the props in action by real unicorns ❤

Hope you guys liked these props and to my sisters all over: Happy Centennial! YITS!